Epic

In what sense is the epic relevant in the present time?

“Epic poems are not merely entertaining stories of legendary or historical heroes; they summarize and express the nature or ideals of an entire nation at a significant or crucial period of its history.” ("Epic." Microsoft® Student 2009 [DVD]. Redmond, WA: Microsoft Corporation, 2008. ) so in the epic Beowulf we have seen the importance of having a great leader which they/we consider as a hero because in those times danger is everywhere and they need someone who can make them feel safe and at ease. This is for me is the basic reason of considering a person as a hero. Nowadays, we are electing our leaders for the hope that they could be our ‘knights in shining armor’ who can make us feel at ease and somehow for the hope that they can save us and protect us from our greatest enemy which is poverty. Unfortunately, the characteristics of an ideal hero in the epic which can all be found in Beowulf are not being practiced by most of our leaders whom we hope as our heroes someday. That instead of protecting us, saving us just like what Beowulf did, some of them just think of their own pleasure and forgetting their people. Having this epic and learning the characteristics of a good leader of a hero in the character of Beowulf help us to remember/remind us in choosing our future leader that embodies the Germanic code (maybe some of them) or possesses moral behavior. For me this might be the relevance of the epic Beowulf in the present time. Although this epic is not our own, it can still help us especially the readers of this poem realize the great responsibility or duty of a leader for him to be consider a hero.

In what way can you make the epic relevant? Relevance

As a student of literature reading the epic and understanding the message that it implies is the least thing that I can do to make this epic relevant because it is in the first place expected of us as a student of literature to

a good reputation is...